Ok. So I'm a HUGE Patrick Ewing fan. Whenever the Knicks, Sonics or Magic come to the good ol' town of Houston I make a point to go see him play. This may be his last year in the NBA, so I made sure that I would get to the Rockets/Magic game tonight (Saturday).
That's when the problems started.
I had to wait until the last minute to buy tickets because I wasn't sure how many people were coming with me. So Friday night I try to buy them online. Of course, there is a problem with my credit card. So I wait unitl this morning (the day of the game) and call Ticketmaster. Lucky for me, the "highly trained" phone rep. basically went to the website and did the same thing that I did last night. He even read the same message I got when the credit card didn't work the previous night.
Well, after some more crap happens, we get to Compaq Center (where the game was) with only about 15 minutes until tipoff, and manage to get pretty good seats at the box office. Cool.
It was a pretty good game. The Magic blew the Rockets out, all the while I'm cheering with my New York Knicks #33 jersey on. Some great dunks. T-Mac dropped 39 points. Steve Francis had 29.
Worst part of the game was me, standing in line for "Express Nachos" for over 20 minutes. All the way through half-time and 7 minutes into the 3rd quarter.
Express nachos..... yeah right.
So we're leaving the game, pretty happy that the night came together fairly well. That is, until we reach the car. The car that isn't there.
Great.
We thought it was stolen, unitl we realized that ALL the cars around us were gone too. And that at the other end of the parking lot there are "Tow Zone" signs in front of the first couple of spaces. Aparently, they mark the ENTIRE lot with just those first signs.
Thanks, guys.
So, we find out what towing company was used, tracked down a pay phone, and called them up. It was going to cost $108 to get the car back. Oh, and we had to actually GET there first.
So I went into the Gas Station that we were at (using the pay phone), took $120.00 out of the ATM, and found a number for a Taxi service. I told the lady at the Taxi place the two intersecting streets, and she was like, "Oh, the Shell station..."
Obviously, were weren't the first people to be towed in that area (duh!).
After a 15 dollar cab ride we get to the wrecker, one of the people I was with says, "What a racket they've got here!" I then dish out the $108 after sigining some paperwork. Just then some (unhappy) guys pull up, and come up in line behind us. One of the guys remark "What a racket they've got here!"
We had a chuckle.
By the time we got our car out there were over 10(!) people in line. All complaining to each other, and all dishing out $108.
What a racket they've got.
We depart the wrecker yard, and on our way home, we almost die. Some guy, that had to be doing WAAAAYYY over 100 mph, BLOWS past us on the empty freeway. He was going so fast, and was so close, that our car shook from the wake. That pissed us off so much, we totally forgot about the wrecker. What if we had changed lanes, or even started changing lanes? We'd all be dead. Of course, the moron in the speeding car would have survived without a scratch.
What a night.
I've got to get up early and go to work.
Good night everyone!
[ 02-17-2002: Message edited by: Illegal Machine ]
